


A Truth So Loud You Can't Ignore

by beautlouis



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: And Neither Do I, Character Study, Domestic Fluff, Engagement, Feelings, Fluff, M/M, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), like steve and bucky are engaged it's cute, lots of declarations of love, tony stank is just a plot device steve doesn't even like him
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-13
Updated: 2016-12-13
Packaged: 2018-09-08 06:40:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8834296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beautlouis/pseuds/beautlouis
Summary: Before the war, before the serum, when it was him and Bucky, and Bucky was all he had, there were the sudden pangs of want, of longing that would strike him: to live a life with Bucky. In those moments, those visions, he was Steve Barnes. And then he'd snap himself out of it because men didn't marry men and that was just plain dumb, imagining himself taking a name like a woman did. But now, he could, and that secret dream carried itself up from the 1930s all the way to reality, here and now. [Steve and Bucky are engaged. They haven't discussed the whole who's taking whose name bit. When it finally comes up, Steve assumes he'll be a Barnes. Bucky has some feelings and Steve has some too.]





	

**Author's Note:**

> This was written a very, very long time ago (like, in August) and I waffled about publishing it. Now I am! This is dedicated to Paula [supersoulmates](http://supersoulmates.tumblr.com/) and Jess [thylas](http://thylas.tumblr.com/) on tumblr, both of whom I each promised very different fics for their birthdays (which were in September). Don't worry, my dears. I will write your space husbands fic eventually! For now, I hope you appreciate this. Thank you for supporting me when I wrote it! I love you both so very much!
> 
>  
> 
>  **Very important note** : I hate Tony Stank a lot, he just made a good plot device for getting the geriartic lovebirds to talk about the whole name thing. I vaguely explore Steve's, and Bucky's, feelings about him but it's not the point of the fic. I just needed to stress that I'm not a Tony apologist!!!
> 
> (This is unbeta'd!)

Bucky’s hand is soft and sweaty where it’s tangled in Steve’s own, clutching just this side of too hard to be casual. In Bucky’s other hand, the metal one, he’s got a pristine cream envelope held carefully between his fingertips. 

Truthfully, Steve hadn't intended on inviting Stark; they’d reached a kind of  _ ceasefire _ sure, but inviting him to his wedding, especially to his wedding with Bucky, wasn’t something he’d assumed would be a reality.  

But then Bucky had said "please Steve”, looked at him with those big blue eyes, and Steve knows it’s because Bucky is trying, that he forgave Stark before Steve and he needs to reach out like this. (It’s a guilt thing, Steve knows, but Bucky will never admit to it. He knows that Bucky’s guilt is irrational, but he also knows that telling Bucky how to feel isn’t quite right. Bucky’s got a therapist and he’s working through things his own way.) Bucky is a better man than Steve ever was.

So Bucky had said “please, Steve”, and, when approached about the matter, Stark said "I don't care, Cap" (which meant "please, Steve") and now they’re here, preparing to hand Stark his very own invitation. Because Bucky needs the formality, and Steve will give him anything he needs. Marriage for Steve was like a written document telling the world that  _ yes _ , he'll give Bucky  _ anything _ , and this is why. 

There’s a quick squeeze from Bucky’s hand and Stark is there in front of them, somehow managing to swagger even while standing still. 

Bucky hands over the envelope, easy as anything, and Stark doesn’t even open it, because he knows what it is and this is ridiculous. Steve wants to go home so they can finish their honeymoon plans. Bucky mentioned Aruba last and Steve’s having wild visions of Bucky soaking up the sun in a little slice of paradise. Bucky shuffles a little closer to Steve’s side when Stark starts talking.

“I actually thought you’d already be hitched, eloping seemed like the kind of overdramatic thing you two would be into,” and then, "which of you lucky gals is taking the name? Or are you doing the hyphen move, that's a gay thing, right?" He’s smirking, very pleased with himself. 

Steve rolls his eyes and scowls, because this is what Stark does. It might even fall under the category of Stark showing something like affection. And anyway Steve has an answer and so he opens his mouth to say ‘me, asshole’, except Bucky’s saying, fast and loud, "I'm taking Steve's name", muscles all tense and metal hand suddenly fumbling to replace his flesh one in Steve’s palm.

Stark raises his brows, spotting Steve's confusion and says, "Right, you gents figure that out. I'll show up in a tux so hot you'll both be wanting to marry me instead.” 

Before Stark turns to walk away, his self-satisfied expression drops into a series of odd muscle twitches that are gone as quickly as they came. And then it’s just him and Bucky, standing in Stark's massive living room (the second biggest of the seven or so he has). 

"Buck?" Steve asks, careful in a way he hasn’t had to be in a long while. 

Bucky had turns to face him but his eyes are somewhere above Steve's right shoulder. "Well, I mean, we can't dismantle Steve Rogers, right? The world needs Steve Rogers, can't be without it." He smiles at Steve, gently, so he knows it isn't an attack on Steve. "Bucky Barnes, on the other hand, world doesn't need more of that attached to it, don't need to add the name of Hydra's weapon to anything, 'specially not to you, baby."

Bucky's accent is thick by the end of his speech and he’s almost twitchy. 

Thing was, Steve hasn't put a whole lot of thought about the name bit, he supposes for most couples when marriage was proposed it was underlined with the whole name change; not as a key part, but certainly a defining factor. When Steve proposed marriage to Bucky it was like a gasp of relief, a fierce desire, a gift to them, a reward and a treasure for all they had been through. It gives Steve a nearly sick rush of satisfaction thinking of calling Bucky his _husband_. And anyway, although he hadn't actively thought of the name situation until now, passively he just...knew he wanted to take Bucky's name.

Before the war, before the serum, when it was him and Bucky, and Bucky was all he had, there were the sudden pangs of want, of longing that would strike him: to live a life with Bucky. In those moments, those visions, he was Steve Barnes. And then he'd snap himself out of it because men didn't marry men and that was just plain dumb, imagining himself taking a name like a woman did. But now, he could, and that secret dream carried itself up from the 1930s all the way to reality, here and now.

He, of course, would never be one to make a fight of it and deny Bucky this, if it was what Bucky really wanted, what Bucky truly wanted for himself. An echo of a wish from the past was nothing enough to make Steve argue the matter.

Right here and now, it wasn't so much that Steve wanted to take his name and Bucky was insisting the reverse, that in and of itself wasn’t what was making Steve frown. It was what Bucky was saying, about himself, the way he talking like—

"I'm sure you're thinking the same now, seeing how Barnes doesn't sound pretty, the Winter Soldier won't look right on a marriage certificate.” Bucky is stumbling over the words, and his eyes are darting around the room the way they do when he’s frightened. _Looking for all the exits, all the threats,_ Steve thinks.

And that is _enough_ , because he's doing it again. Even after all this time, Bucky’s thinking that Bucky Barnes equaled the Winter Soldier, that Bucky himself belonged still to Hydra, that his _name_ and his _identity_ were somehow tarnished by what had been done to him.

" _Bucky_ ," Steve says, cutting him off like he never did. He grabs Bucky's waist and pulls him close, so that they’re pressed to each other from shoulders down. Bucky's eyes are wide and startled, because rarely ever did Steve get so intimate outside their home. He liked kissing Bucky, holding his hand, rubbing his neck, that sort of thing. But this, this was close and personal and he was holding Bucky the way he did when he wanted to breathe him in and love him until he couldn't think for anything else.

"Listen to me, Bucky," Steve implores. "I love you so goddamn much, I can't—I can't move sometimes, thinking about how much I love you. And—and I'm in love with you, James Buchanan Barnes. At the end of the day, when there's nothing, nothing at all, and it's just me—all I can say for myself is I have Bucky Barnes, Bucky Barnes has got me all to himself. God, Bucky. And I've got the name Steve _Rogers_ , you're right: like it's a brand, a company name, the kind you stamp on souvenirs at amusement parks.

“And I don't want that if I don't have to have that, I don't want our marriage to be—to be that brand, alright, I don't want our family under that weight, if—if I don't have to. If you really want my name, Buck, l'll give it to you, I swear I will. I'll give you anything you want. But Jesus, James Buchanan fucking Barnes, you are brave and strong and I want you all the time, always, and it is _not_ the Winter Soldier I'm giving myself to, it is not the Winter Soldier I'm taking for myself. It's _Barnes_ , okay, and—and I'm dizzy thinking about being a Barnes, if you'll have me. About our marriage being the—the Barneses, Christ. Our children being Barneses—"

Here, Bucky inhales sharply and wetly and Steve realizes his mouth is nearly touching Bucky's as he speaks and Steve himself is shaking, and he said children, didn't he, and he meant it but right this second he means more simply and deeply: "Bucky, Bucky, Bucky, _Bucky_ , if you want me to be, I'll be Steve Barnes, I _will_ , for you.”

Bucky's mouth is on his and Steve loves him so fucking much, and Bucky is murmuring into the kiss, "take it, please, take my name, I want it."

Steve feels wild the way he does sometimes with Bucky, frantic, almost panicked with how he can't get close enough to Bucky. He's aware of how he's grabbing at Bucky, hands everywhere, clutching and gasping so much he's surely ruining their kiss. It's not even sexual, really, though often it becomes so. Right now, it's not; it's the overwhelming feeling that he can't just hold Bucky close enough that they'll become permanently intertwined, that each time they _breathe_ it'll be together and they'll never need anything else.

He's aware he's choking on his own inhales slightly and Bucky cups Steve's jaw, thumb pressing into the soft of his throat, pulls him away just slightly. His metal hand comes up to comb through Steve's hair.

"I'm sor--" Steve starts, flushing a little, but Bucky is speaking over him.

"I love you, Stevie," Bucky whispers, eyes shining so blue it almost burns through Steve. "I—I, when you proposed marriage, I thought about it. Got almost hungry, I swear to God, imagining you with my name. But then, I thought, you're too good for that name, and anyhow what was I thinking, you'd never want it. I know," Bucky says when Steve opens his mouth indignantly, "I know, I shouldn't be assuming what you want, shoulda asked, shouldn't be thinking of myself as the Winter Soldier." His eyes are sparkling, and he's doing a fabulous impression of Steve, just the way he was about to say it, too.

Steve scrunches his nose, “Jerk."

Bucky sticks his tongue out, "Punk."

Before Bucky's even finished the word Steve licks over Bucky's lips playfully and Bucky makes a very adorable (Bucky would never admit it) squeaking noise. Steve doesn't get a chance to call him out on it because Bucky says, all soft and meaningful, "I can't believe I have you. I love you so fucking much. Every time I hear someone say they're in love, I think ' _poor bastard thinks they're in love_ ' because they can't possibly feel what I'm feelin' for you and nothing else could possibly compare.

“I love you, so much that the universe fucked with time for us. It knew how much I love you and let you find me seven decades after I lost you, can you believe that? Nobody could get close to feeling what I've got for you, pal. I'm not much, I'm damaged—shut up, you know I've got hurts and shadows—but the one thing I do have is loving you so good I know have to be more than a weapon, to be better than a machine. Thank you for—for lettin’ me love you, baby. For making me something _good_.

"Gonna marry the hell outta you, make you a Barnes and love you until the universe decides it's given us enough time and then I'm gonna love you in the next life too. You're not shaking me for anything." Bucky laughs wildly. "Please kiss me before I get dumber."

Steve does. He kisses him soft this time, he's shaking a little (a lot) and touching Bucky so gently, gentle like he's made of glass, but not because he thinks Bucky is fragile. He touches him gently because he's so overwhelmed by Bucky he's afraid of himself, of just grabbing Bucky and squeezing him too close, of taking _too much_.

Steve has just about reached absolute paradise, standing there kissing his Bucky, when there's a voice, calm and collected, talking to them. "Mr. Stark would like me to let Mr. Rogers and Mr. Barnes know," Stark's computer system reports pleasantly, "he quote is 'happy you two geriatric vets have figured your name shit out, and approves of the decision since the hyphen thing is without taste. But if you are going to have sex he'd prefer you do it at your own home or if you must, at the fourth floor bathroom which is without automatic surveillance cameras’ end quote.”

"Jesus fucking Christ," Steve says, looking up to the heavens, hoping for deliverance.

"Language," Bucky says, like the brat he is, but he's shifting awkwardly now, clearly uncomfortable with Stark's intrusion.

Steve fights back an urge to find Stark and punch him, as has become the norm whenever he thinks about Stark and Bucky in the same space in his mind. He has to remind himself that Stark is his ally, even if he was a fucking asshole, and that bygones are bygones and that Bucky wants to be _cordial_ with Stark, and Stark wants to make nice with Bucky in his own way and and _and_...Steve has to take several deep breaths.

Steve separates himself from Bucky but keeps a hand on the small of Bucky's back. "We're _leaving_ ," he says loudly and irritably, and Bucky pinches his hip.

The voice speaks up again as they hurry towards the elevator. "Mr. Stark would like me to inform you that he quote is 'honored to have received your invitation to your wedding, and looks forward to addressing you as Mr. and Mr. Barnes for the rest of your lives in every situation ever’ end quote."

Bucky smiles, "It's cute that he thinks that will annoy us."

Steve loves Bucky Barnes so goddamn much.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! It's short and mostly just sappy declarations of love but I wanted to post it anyway. I hope you liked it! Kudos and comments feed my crops and I do my best to respond to each comment.


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